


M is for Modus Operandi

by paradisecity



Category: Numb3rs
Genre: M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2006-10-01
Updated: 2006-10-01
Packaged: 2018-01-09 05:53:23
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,885
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1142250
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/paradisecity/pseuds/paradisecity
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Colby adjusts to life in L.A. and a new twist on his old dating philosophy.</p>
            </blockquote>





	M is for Modus Operandi

**Author's Note:**

> Written for the "M is for modus operandi" prompt at the Numb3rs Ficathon. Many thanks to E. for the wonderful beta.

**a characteristic pattern of methods**  
L.A. is nothing like Colby expects.

Idaho was expansive but empty. That close to the Rockies the foothills encroached on the land and Colby always felt unwelcome, unwanted. It never felt like home.

After Idaho there was training and deployment: army bases that were similar only in their purposeful facelessness, urban warfare training in mock villages populated only by ghosts, Afghani sand that stretched out miles around him in silent hostility.

When he left the military and finished his exit assessments only a small handful of years later, the staff shrink warned him he might have trouble adjusting to civilian life. He'd always had difficulty forming attachments, she said.

Colby thought of the two British agents dead in his wake, walked out the door, and never looked back.

Civilization returned to him as he returned to it. He came to know himself for the first time not as a son or a soldier but as a man. He was flushed with the freedom to come and go as he pleased, to have, if he chose, no more responsibility than the purchase of a midmorning coffee. He never forgot what he did or who he was—that he'd always carry with him—but the war faded more quickly than he'd anticipated and he woke one morning to find himself as close to a civilian as he was ever going to get. It felt like a victory.

When word came back on the FBI job it was in the form of a relocation package. He cashed in the plane ticket, bought some jerky and a tank of gas, threw his duffel in the back of the truck, and set out to see the country he'd spent years defending.

When he gets to L.A., dusty with easy miles traveled and exhausted with bone-deep satisfaction, it's nothing like he expects.

It's nothing like he expects because it feels like home.

 

 **used to identify the culprit**  
He doesn't know what to make of Don at first. He's got that tired, pinched look to him that means he's either very good at his job or very bad. Colby hasn't heard much one way or another, but he's willing to give Don the benefit of the doubt.

David gives him the fish-eye and since he's no longer the new kid on the block, it's his right. Colby knows as the new guy he's likely to be a pain in their collective ass for a bit despite his best efforts to the contrary, so he can take this one for the team.

Then he meets Megan, who's all hair flip and firm handshake.

"Megan Reeves, behavioral specialist."

Great. A shrink. "A shrink," he says.

She doesn't miss a beat. "You angry or paranoid?"

He doesn't say a word.

"Avoidant," she says. "I can work with that."

She does so by hauling him down to the coffee shop around the corner ("The office coffee isn't exactly a crime against humanity, but Don doesn't like us to get too comfortable.") and peppering him with seemingly innocuous questions. He's not even done with his first cup by the time he's telling her about Rebecca Daniels and the topless -- but not convertible -- Mustang from his sophomore year of college. He stops short.

"You're good," he says, begrudgingly.

She laughs. "Nah. You're just easy."

\--------

The more he settles in, the more he likes the job. It's the height of summer, when the heat adds that extra bit of urgency to the air, and he hits the ground running. It doesn't take him long to recognize his initial instincts were right: Don's very good at his job. And so is he.

He doesn’t mind the long hours and weekends. He's not an 8-to-5 kind of guy, never has been, and when the case is hot, it's hot. Still, he enjoys the weekends he does get. He checks out the music, the sports, the women. Plays a round at a couple of golf courses, spends a long afternoon driving down the Pacific Coast Highway. He does the touristy things natives never do: checks out the Chinese Theatre, goes to Universal Studios, walks down Rodeo Drive for the hell of it and almost lets himself get picked up by a woman old enough to be his mother before he notices her wedding ring. He's spent years looking at nondescript barracks walls and endless expanses of sand; he has no problem playing the tourist in a land born and bred for it, no matter how obviously it marks him as an outsider. One day, he won't be.

One of the secretaries is suggesting his visit Wayfarer's Chapel next (and maybe angling for a date, although that could just be wishful thinking on his part) when a rumpled, agitated young man who looks like he has no business in the Bureau office interrupts them and demands to know where Don is.

"You're looking for Agent Eppes?" Colby asks, and the man huffs impatiently and says, "Yes, Don, where's Do--" and then spots him entering the bullpen and makes a beeline in his direction.

Colby's about to follow him when David rushes past, pulling on his jacket, and says, "Come on, we got a hit on a warrant out for Ian Reyes."

"Who's Ian Reyes?" Colby asks, but he's already following.

 

 **a proper subject for expert testimony**  
The next time Colby sees Mr. Rumpled and Agitated, he's explaining how Bayesian filters can help them narrow down suspects in the Trelane case. Colby's so surprised to find out _this_ is the Charlie Eppes he's heard so much about that when Charlie says, "Pi," Colby parrots back, "Pi?" stupidly and then has to explain he knows what it is.

He doesn't think Charlie believes him.

To no one's surprise but his own, Charlie helps them wrap the case. It's not an uncommon occurrence according to Megan, who tries to explain Charlie's involvement with the Bureau. "He can take some getting used to," she says, and, off Colby's skepticism adds, "We have different approaches to methodology. But behaviorism is really the quantification of psychology -- our sciences have more in common than you'd think. And he's good. I don't understand how he really does it half the time, but he's been a big help." She pauses, then smiles. "But he still takes some getting used to."

 

 **if it meets the ordinary tests of relevance**  
The next week Don invites Colby to dinner with his family. Colby's oddly nervous -- he's never had a boss so much as he's had COs and he realizes he's ill-equipped to deal with civilian office politics.

David gives him the fish-eye (though a lesser version, finally) and takes him for coffee at the place around the corner. "Don't sweat it," he says. "Don does it with all the new guys. He's wound a little tight, but he's not that bad. He just needs a vacation."

"Yeah, or to get laid," Colby adds, because _wound a little tight_ is like saying the Grand Canyon's a hole in the ground.

David gives him the fish-eye, full force.

"Right," Colby quickly corrects. "Vacation."

"Besides," David adds as they leave, after having stuck Colby with the check, "his dad makes a mean steak."

 

 **and is sufficiently beyond ordinary experience**  
Colby doesn't know about the steak, but Alan does give a mean house tour. It's a great place, old and homey, and Alan has a lot of practical advice on the real estate market. Colby's thinking about buying -- not that he can afford anything right now, but he'll be able to soon. And without a family to provide for yet, it's a good time to set himself up in a secure financial position for when they come along.

They finish the tour in the garage, where Charlie's chalkboards are cocked up at crazy angles all over the walls and ceiling. There's little room left, so he's working on one squeezed into a corner by the air hockey table. Alan has to call Charlie's name three times to get his attention and when he does, Charlie looks up offers a sheepish smile. "Sorry," he says, dusting his hands off on his pants. "Colby, right?"

Colby nods and shakes his hand, looking around at the undecipherable scribbles. "What are you working on?"

"The Poincaré conjecture," Charlie says. "It's a Millennium problem and I've got a colleague in--"

Alan gives Colby a fondly exasperated smile. "Come on, Charlie," he says. "Dinner's almost ready."

David was right: Alan does make a mean steak. And Don's not always as tightly wound as Colby thought, though whether that's a function of him being off the clock, around his family, or the beer, Colby's not really sure.

After dinner, which is mostly painless -- the only bump in the road is a strained silence about Don's last job in Albuquerque, which Alan brought up, so Colby considers the dinner a win on his part -- Alan and Don clean up and Colby's barred from helping. He can hear Alan's gentle ribbing wafting through the open window ("Trying to impress him, Donny? I thought he was supposed to impress you." "Hey, I help clean up." "Once a presidency.") and Colby thinks that what makes this home so warm and welcoming has nothing to do with the wood and nails that hold it together.

Then Charlie's at his side, offering him a fresh beer, and Colby turns it down. "Thanks," he says, "but I shouldn't. Dinner at my boss's and everything."

"You talked about baseball," Charlie says, an edge of something Colby can't identify in his voice. "Trust me, you'll be fine."

"Not a sports fan?"

"Uh." Charlie squints and scratches his nose, like he's thinking hard. "Curling and street luge. Do they count?"

"Street luge?" Colby asks, because he didn't really figure Charlie for that kind of risk taker.

"Well, okay," he admits, "more like glorified go-carts. But with a purpose: GM sponsors a contest to help inform the next generation of high-performance automobiles -- research they don't really have to pay for. Given limited materials and design parameters, we compete to build the fastest vehicle we can."

"What's the prize?"

"Seventy-five thousand dollars in departmental funds."

Colby boggles. "And that's research they don't have to pay for?"

"Actually, it's a lot cheaper than any direct research they'd contract. And the money doesn't really matter, really. Mostly it's bragging rights."

"Yeah?" Colby asks, amused, because though he's never given much thought to the secret life of scientists, this isn't what he expected.

"Stanford never places, but they won last year. They've been a pain in the ass ever since," Charlie says, more than a touch bitterly. "This year, we're gonna shut 'em out."

Colby's trying hard not to laugh. "Yeah? You and who?"

"Me and my team. Larry, a friend of mine -- he's a physicist, a couple of my grad students, and we borrowed -- well, okay, stole, but borrowed -- an engineering student from the department. She designed a new type of fastener that really cuts down on wind resistance and improves the aerodynamics. We're clocking in at almost 70 miles an hour. Stanford can't touch it."

"Wow," Colby says, impressed despite himself. "From a go-cart?"

"An _unmotorized_ go-cart," Charlie adds proudly. "You know, I do seminars every other weekend -- Dad calls them math for dummies, although they're really more like math and science for laypeople -- and I'm doing one on Saturday about aerodynamics and automobile racing, if you want to come. They're open to the public."

Colby's trying to come up with a polite way to decline, but Charlie interrupts him before he gets there. "Really, it's fun. A lot of people actually enjoy it. There's no reason to be intimidated by math -- anyone can understand it if it's explained to them properly. And they should: we all use math, every day. It's not just formulas and equations, y'know, it's, it's how we solve the biggest mysteries we know."

Charlie pauses. "Uh, sorry. I wasn't supposed to, y'know--"

"Give the impassioned math speech?" Colby asks.

Charlie ducks his head, blushing a little. "Yeah, that. Strict orders not to, actually. Anyway, you don't have to come if you don't want to but if you're interested, think about it. It's always nice to see a new face."

Huh. "Yeah, okay. Maybe I will."

"Really?" Charlie asks, and he's so pleasantly surprised Colby decides he really will go. He doesn't get a personal invitation to learn from a certified math genius every day and it's not like he had plans for the weekend yet, anyway.

Then Alan and Don come spilling out of the kitchen in the midst of a friendly argument that, from the look on Don's face, they've had a thousand times before.

"I'm not an old maid," Don says, " it's not like I'm AARP age yet."

"I'll have you know the AARP--" Alan starts, but Don cuts him off and nods in Colby's direction.

"And when they keep sending me kids fresh off the corn field, it doesn't make it any easier."

But Don's loose and smiling and Colby knows Don's just giving him a hard time, so he grins and says, "Hey, don't insult me like that. In Idaho we grow _potatoes._ "

 

 **to render probable assistance to the jury**  
Saturday comes and goes in a hail fire of bullets. Colby's just glad to get it out of the way -- he'd been wondering how long it would be before he was shot at. Afterward, he buys a six pack, goes home alone, and spends the evening being grateful for shooters with poor aim.

He completely forgets about Charlie's seminar until he visits his office at CalSci for the first time a few weeks later. He wanted to come out and see what it was like, satisfy his curiosity, but next time he thinks he'll just make a phone call instead. Being on campus makes him feel like a dumb jock; these are certainly a far cry from the kind of kids he went to college with.

It doesn't help that he gets lost on his way, or that his suit and bearing are like a sign taped to his back, "Ask me why I don't belong here!" By the time he gets to Charlie's office, he's more than a little annoyed and if Charlie doesn't have anything for him, he's going to have to upgrade that to seriously pissed.

But when he walks in the door, Charlie's staring at his chalkboard and muttering to himself, books and papers and all manner of items Colby couldn't even begin to identify strewn around him, looking for all the world like someone's kid brother. And he remembers that even though Charlie's students may have reason to be intimidated by him, he doesn't. To Colby, Charlie really _is_ someone's kid brother.

He checks on Charlie's progress, snags a gumball (Charlie notes his preference with no explanation, though Colby's sure there's an esoteric mathematical one) and lets his Idaho slip when he says, "Okey dokey." Charlie just smiles.

Charlie, of course, has done what they asked and narrowed down the suspect list, so Colby heads back to the office to help Megan and David take a closer look at Stanbury. As he leaves, he sees a flyer for Charlie's next seminar on a bulletin board, grabs it, and takes it home.

\--------

Charlie's great at what he does as a mathematician, but as Colby sits through his seminar, he sees Charlie's great as a teacher as well (and not just because he shows them how to cheat at tic tac toe. Colby's already planning to win a small fortune off David during their next stakeout). He obviously enjoys what he does, all bright eyes and wide smiles and Colby understands why there are so many young women in the audience.

After tic tac toe, Charlie walks them through the theory behind the randomization of slot machines. It comes complete with an interactive demonstration that somehow culminates in four audience members wearing hats made of bananas, to everyone's amusement, and Colby can't remember the last time he sat in a classroom and heard laughter. Charlie then wraps up with a short presentation from a behaviorist who talks to them about the environmental psychology of casinos. It's interesting stuff, all of it, and Colby doesn't have any difficulty understanding it. It might even come in handy one day.

When the two-hour seminar is called to an end, Colby's surprised to find his attention hasn't wandered. It was an enjoyable way to spend his afternoon -- not that Colby thought Charlie was lying, exactly, but "fun" and "math seminar" aren't two concepts he's ever associated before.

There are already a group of girls hovering near Charlie's table at the front of the room by the time Colby stands to leave. He wonders if the universal karmic return for being a nerd in high school is gorgeous co-ed groupies when you're old and experienced enough to really enjoy them, then decides he doesn't want to know. He catches Charlie's attention and waves before he turns to go, but Charlie calls after him.

"Colby! Hey, hang on."

He motions him over Colby makes his way down to the front of the room amid curious stares from the girls. He stands off to the side while Charlie patiently (and apparently obliviously, though it could just be that he's used to it by now, and that's something Colby really doesn't want to think about) dispatches his admirers.

"So what did you think?" Charlie asks, after the last of them have been turned away.

"It was good, Charlie," Colby says. "You're really good at this teaching thing."

"Yeah? Well, this isn't teaching, not the kind with chalkboards and formulas and symbols. This is...this is more like conversations with people who just don't know they have the spirit of a mathematician yet."

Colby grins. "Is that what it is?"

"I think so." Charlie hops up on the table and smiles almost shyly. "So, thanks for coming -- I didn't think you would. Dad and Don come sometimes, but I think they do it because they think they have to, not because they get anything out of it. But I was watching you, and you, you seemed to enjoy it, right?"

"Yeah, I did. I've never been a math person, but the way you explain things, it's cool. It makes sense."

"Good," Charlie says, with more than a little satisfaction. "It's supposed to."

"Plus, the way you taught us to cheat at tic tac toe--"

"Okay first," Charlie says, looking slightly offended, "that was not _cheating_ , that was _legitimate probability theory_ and second--"

Colby just laughs.

 

 **the admission of expert testimony**  
When he rolls into work Monday the first thing he hears is a, "Rough weekend, Granger?" from Megan.

Just because he looks like an overgrown frat boy doesn't mean he is one -- but it doesn't mean he didn't used to be one, either. He's mostly outgrown it by now, but Megan seems to live in hopes he'll try to recapture his youth. It's probably so she can live vicariously through him and he'd say something smartass about it but then she'd get Freudian on him and that's the last thing he needs on a Monday morning. But telling her the truth -- that the most enjoyable part of his weekend was spent with Charlie -- makes him oddly uncomfortable, so he relies on the usual instead.

"You know it," he says. "Took home a set of twins -- redheads, stacked. Identical, too, right down to the little freckle above their--"

She socks him in the arm, hard, and grins. "Come on, Granger. You're buying me breakfast."

"Why, you wanna hear all about it?"

"I think that's sexual harassment," David says mildly from behind his cube.

"Not if I can kick his ass, it's not," Megan says.

"You can't kick my ass."

"I could take you down," and then, off his look, "Oh, you _wish._ Come on, Granger. Breakfast."

\--------

A few weeks go by and Colby doesn't see much of Charlie. He's busy navigating the most hallowed of America's institutions: bureaucracy. The FBI may be a preferential hirer, but he thinks it just means they prefer to dump more paperwork on him.

He's out of the office until they pick up the Medina case and end up playing lapdog to Homeland Security. It's frustrating on all kinds of levels and they're being blocked at every turn until he hears Charlie's worked his magic on the suspect list again.

Colby runs into him in the break room while everyone else is being gathered for the briefing and the A/V's being set up. Charlie hesitates, then looks at him awkwardly and says, "Haven't seen you around much."

Colby pours himself a fresh cup of coffee. "Probably because I haven't been around much -- been recertifying on arms and explosives and PT and all that other crap. Paperwork?" he says, " _Sucks_."

"Oh," Charlie says. "Yeah. Don hates that part of the job, too."

"I swear, sometimes I think the easiest way to bring the government down would be to poison the paper." He tosses his stirrer in the trash. "They'd kill us all with paper cuts inside a week."

Charlie laughs, and looks oddly startled. "You might want to be careful who you say that to."

Colby nods. "Yeah," he agrees. "But it's _you._ "

 

 **a matter of broad discretion by the trial judge**  
After all the imaginary bombs are defused and the terror level is back to "unnecessary panic," Colby feels edgy and restless, even after the debrief. He realizes that this is going to be the hardest part of adjusting to civilian life: in the military, he was always _in_ the military. It was always a high-stress situation; it only changed by degrees. Here, it's one high-stress situation after another, but between them he's expected to return to a civilian's even keel. There's no way to blow off the steam he's built up -- until he starts looking for one.

"Oh, yeah, I've done that before," Charlie says when Colby calls to ask. "Why, are you interested?"

"Really? You've gone sky diving?"

"Yeah. It was fun."

"Huh," Colby says. "It doesn't really seem like something you'd be into."

"Well, it's all math and physics: friction, lift, drag. I appreciate a practical application of the concepts. It's just not something I have the chance to do often."

"Was it a rush?"

"From what I remember, but it's been a while. Last time I did it was with Larry at an indoor place in Vegas."

"Larry?"

"Yeah." Colby can hear Charlie's smile. "You know how Vegas can get." Colby doesn't, but he makes a noncommittal noise of agreement anyway. "It was during the Western Regional Particle Physics conference. They took us to a facility right down the street from the convention center. I'd never even heard of indoor skydiving until then. Man, that was a great conference." Charlie laughs. "Do you know who Brian Greene is?"

Colby wonders if this is going to be another impassioned math speech. "Don't think so."

"He wrote a couple of popular science books. _The Elegant Universe, Fabric of the Cosmos_?"

"Nah," Colby says. "Never read 'em."

"Well, he and Larry got into a math fight in the middle of the conference. It was pretty cool."

"Really?" He can imagine Charlie getting into a math fight -- has seen it, even -- but it's not something he can imagine Larry doing. "You serious?"

"Yeah. See, Brian's a string theorist and Larry's a supergravity theorist. They're like the Hatfields and McCoys of the physics world, right? And the two of them, they go way back, a lot of bad blood there--"

"Why? What happened?" Colby asks. It sounds like there's a girl in there somewhere (all the good stories are really about a girl) and now Colby's curious.

"I don't know," Charlie says. "Larry won't tell me. Must be good. So anyway, Brian was presenting on polarization flux and I told Larry not to go because it would just irritate him, y'know, and then he'd be moody and weird -- well, weirder than usual -- for the rest of the day, but Larry never listens. So we're sitting there and he's getting more and more agitated because the math just didn't back up what Brian was saying. Finally he couldn't take it anymore so he stood up in front of everyone, pointed at Brian, and called him a big fat cheater."

"A big fat cheater?" _That_ sounds like a math fight Colby can imagine.

Charlie's laughing now. "He did! And if you ask him about, all he'll say is, 'Charles, don't exaggerate. The room wasn't more than half full.' Yeah, it was standing room only."

Colby grins. The secret life of scientists. "So what did Brian do?"

"Brian said he was just jealous and they had a nice little shouting match, but Larry had already started with 'big fat cheater' so there wasn't really anywhere to go from there. I managed get to Larry out before they escorted him out -- just barely, and Brian stopped the presentation after that. I heard he doesn't even list it on his CV anymore.

"But the skydiving? That was fun, too. I'd love to do it again."

"Cool," Colby says. "You free this Saturday?"

 

 **and is not to be disturbed unless clearly erroneous**  
He says much the same thing the following weekend, when he comes home on a Friday evening and can't face another night in his empty apartment with another frozen pizza.

He realizes abruptly that his list of people to call in such a situation is significantly shorter than it used to be. He's lost touch with a lot of the friends he made when he first got into town and it's been nearly a month since his last date. He says a silent word of apology to Mercedes, because he really was going to call her. He just never quite got around to it.

So he calls Charlie instead and when he picks up there's the low hum of interference that tells Colby he's still at CalSci. "Hey, Charlie," he says, "you busy?"

"Oh, hey, Colby," Charlie replies, distractedly. "No, no, not really. Just grading some papers."

"How's it going?"

"Eh," Charlie says, and Colby can almost see him shrugging on the other end of the line. "They really liked the demonstration with the, uh, the exploding soda, but I don't think they liked the fluid dynamics behind it nearly as much."

"You blow up soda?" Colby says, slightly put out. "I haven't been to that seminar."

"I do it in class. It's Math and Molecules: An Introduction to Fluid Dynamics. An Eppes classic, apparently. Although...hmm." He sounds less distracted now, and Colby knows he's probably set his papers aside on top of a pile of others, where he won't find them until the third time he goes looking for them. "I suppose I could explode something in a seminar. Explosions always go over disturbingly well. I could use it to illustrate backscatter or, or even some of the science behind forensics. That's big now."

"Yeah," Colby says, "you could. Just let me know when, okay? If something's blowing up, I'm there."

"Disturbing, see? I--"

"So," he says, cutting Charlie off because he knows how difficult it can be to get him back on track. "You hungry?"

Charlie pauses like he has to check. "Wow," he says, "it's that late already? Wow. Yeah. Wow."

Colby laughs. "You wanna go grab something? I don't feel like cooking."

" _Can_ you cook?" Charlie asks suspiciously.

"Well, no. That's part of the problem."

"Yeah, me either. My dad can, he's pretty good. And Don can grill, but -- I don't know, it's primordial or something. Give man fire and he'll roast beast."

Colby laughs. "Not much of a beast roaster yourself?"

"Nah. I was always more interested in the geometric curves of the migratory patterns of the beast. But hey, I know a good beasthouse on La Cienega."

"Cool," Colby says. "Meet you there?"

He takes a cab because where there's beast, there's beer. When he gets there Charlie's at the bar, being all but eaten as an appetizer by a Mrs. Robinson and looking vaguely panicked about it all. Colby watches for a minute, grinning, before he goes to rescue him.

"Thanks," Charlie says gratefully as they wend their way through the tables. "She was a little, uh, persistent."

"The good ones always are."

"The good--? See, I'm just bad at this. I started out poorly and it was all downhill from there."

"What, at dating?"

"Yeah. My first date should have been great, right? It was after I'd published my first article and a professor from Columbia was so impressed she invited me to spend the weekend with her."

"So what went wrong?"

"My dad didn't let me go. I was only fourteen." Colby makes a sympathetic face but Charlie can see he's trying to hold back his laughter. "What?" he says, defensive. "What? I was a precocious child."

"I don't think precocious even begins to describe you, Charlie. So what about now? I've heard you and Amita...?"

Charlie's expression is pained. "We are and then we aren't and...I don't know. I think we aren't, now."

"You think?"

"See?" Charlie says. "Downhill."

Colby shakes his head and buys him another round.

\--------

"I've never seen anyone season their drinks before," Charlie says, loose and a little lush after a good meal and a few beers.

"You've been watching me do it all night," Colby says, salting and liming his beer. He may be white, but he's not ignorant. "It's the only way to drink Corona."

"Hmm," Charlie says, and a slow smile spreads across his face. "Okay."

Colby laughs. He should have been watching Charlie more carefully—he'd forgotten he was a lightweight—and he's just glad Charlie doesn't live with Don because he wouldn't be looking forward to returning Charlie in this condition. "I think that's your last one, Charlie."

Charlie looks at the half-empty bottle he's been nursing for the last twenty minutes. "Yeah," he says. "Me, too."

The waiter comes by with the check in hand and asks, "Will there be anything else?"

"No," Colby replies, "but if you could call us two cabs?"

"Certainly," he says, and disappears

Charlie takes a last drink from his bottle, then sets it aside, frowning at it like he's struggling with something. "Thanks, Colby," he finally says, and when he looks up there's an expression Colby can't read. That happens a lot. "For getting me out and...stuff. I forget, y'know, when I'm working and, well, I've never been good at friends or, or anything else, and I, sometimes I--"

"You're welcome, Charlie."

Charlie frowns again, then laughs softly. "Yeah," he says. "Okay."

Colby finishes off his beer, then reaches for the check and bats Charlie's hand away when he does the same.

"No, no, let me get that," Charlie says and Colby says, "No, I'll get it, I invited you," and Charlie says, "Okay, but I'll get it next time," and then Colby stops short.

A date. This is a date.

And it's not their first.

Well, _shit_.

"Colby?" Charlie asks, and Colby reaches for his wallet numbly.

He's never thought about this -- it's never even been a possibility on his radar -- but Colby knows his own M.O. well enough to know exactly what this is. _The first date_ , his cousin Ralph had told him years ago, filling in for the older brother Colby never had, _should always be something the girl likes to do. Try to impress her, but not too much. No false advertising, man._

 _The second date should be something you like to do, and if she's prissy or can't have fun or complains the whole time, then there's no third date. 'Cause girls, there are the nice ones, but there are the ones who can smell weakness a mile away. You start that_ , Ralph had said, _and in a few years you'll end up like Uncle Howard_. Colby had shuddered at the thought.

 _Third date_ , Ralph had finished, _is always a nice dinner -- somewhere she'll think is nice, Cole, not somewhere you think is nice. And never let her pay for anything, no matter what she says, 'cause that's not the way we do it_. Then he'd grinned. _And if you're good after three, then it's all up to you, kid_.

It was a philosophy Colby had been subscribing to since he'd gone on his first date at fifteen to the state fair with Lindsey Patterson.

"You okay?"

"Yeah," Colby says. "Yeah, I'm fine."

He takes a deep breath and tries to be fine, because this doesn't have to mean anything. It's not like he did it on purpose. He didn't even know what he was doing, really.

He repeats that like a mantra as he pays for dinner, ignoring Charlie's questioning glances, and leads him outside. They have to wait a few minutes for the first cab to show and Colby's glad for the chill -- he feels less muddled when he tries to think.

"So, hey," Charlie says after a moment, "you busy next weekend? I know this Italian place with the best pizzaiola."

The thing is, he may not have known what he was doing, but he did it just the same. That must mean something.

"I don't know," Colby says. "I--"

Or it doesn't have to mean anything. Not if he doesn't want it to.

Maybe he does. He doesn't know.

_It's all up to you, kid._

There's only one way to find out and L.A. is Colby's chance to do things right, to do it all his way, whatever that may mean. So he takes a deep breath, jumps off the edge, and it feels like skydiving all over again when he says, "Yeah. Sounds good."

"You sure?"

He's not, but he's already jumped, for better or worse. And he trusts Charlie to help him land safely.

"Yeah, I'm sure."

The first cab pulls up then and he gives it to Charlie.

"Thanks for dinner," Charlie says. "It was fun." He hesitates, then hugs Colby. It takes Colby by surprise and makes him wonder if Charlie knows, how long he's known, if he's been waiting for Colby to figure it out, or if there's an outside chance he's been reading the whole thing all wrong.

But Charlie is still overbright and smudged around the edges from the beer, so Colby just helps him into the cab instead. As he pulls away, he brushes his lips softly against Charlie's temple and says, "Good night, Charlie," and Charlie looks up at him with warm liquid eyes and a pleased smile.

"Good night."

He watches the cab drive off and breathes easy for the first time in a long time. No one says he has to land tonight; freefall might be a nice place to be for a while.

He foregoes the next cab in favor of walking, at least for a little while. The city is loud and bright around him, muted to the dull roar that keeps him company each day. The sky is wide and open above him, inviting.

This city. His city.

He walks along and thinks, home.

_Home._


End file.
